Associate HR Business Partner (FTC – 31/03/2026)

Job overview

Band 6 AFC - Associate HR Business Partner based at Prospect Park Hospital – Reading, support our mental health inpatient operation. Fixed term contract until 31st March 2026.

We are now seeking a CIPD qualified, experienced HR practitioner to join our team to support in the Adults Mental Health division.

We are looking for someone who has a generalist HR background, particularly employee relations as you will be working closely with the HR Advisor and overseeing the full range of the employee relations casework within the Mental Health Services Division. It is essential that you are able to demonstrate your experience of advising managers on complex employee relations casework up to and including dismissal, HR policies and organisational change.

This role will provide opportunities to work more strategically in supporting your services with workforce planning, change management and transformation, engagement and building leadership capability.

As a Trust we are big on staff development and “grow your own” and can in return offer you a wealth of both inhouse and external development opportunities including the opportunity to do Affina Team Coaching.

You will report to the mental health services people business partner and work in partnership with the inpatient’s leadership team supporting the delivery of employee relations casework and the development of the inpatient team’s knowledge, capability and confidence in managing their teams HR processes.

Main duties of the job

• Provide professional HR advice to all levels of managers across the full range of employee relations issues

• Oversight and supervision of band 5 HR Advisor

• Build and maintain credible relationships with Service Managers within the division ensuring complex or sensitive information is communicated in a confident way

• Act as a point of contact for managers and staff seeking advice on various policies, analysing queries to offer solutions

• Advise managers on recruitment processes, providing advice on the writing of job descriptions and person specifications
• Work closely with your People Business Partner to ensure that the services within your division are delivering their “people priorities”.

Interview will be held on 1st Dec 2025

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The “must haves” for this role:

• Degree or equivalent experience

• Working towards or holding a CIPD Level 7 qualification (or equivalent experience in a generalist HR role)

• Experience working in a generalist HR role with Employee Relations in a multi-skilled professional and unionised environment

• Ability to travel to multiple sites with minimal impact on daily productivity

For further information about the role, please see attached job description and person specification.

We strongly encourage you to review how you meet the criteria in the person specification and write about this point-by-point in your supporting statement for the best chance of being shortlisted.

We’re committed to equal opportunities and welcome applications from all sections of the community. Our commitment to inclusion is reflected in our accreditations: Race Equality Matters Silver Trailblazer, Neurodiversity in Business Corporate Member, Disability Confident Leader, Carer Confident Level 2, and the Armed Forces Covenant Gold Award. Reasonable adjustments will be provided to candidates as needed.

We welcome a conversation about flexibility and any other questions you may have. Please don’t hesitate to contact: Fran Langan on [email protected]   or Mike Thomas on [email protected] who’ll be delighted to help.

Please note, if we receive a high number of applications, we may close this role earlier than the advertised closing date, so please submit your application as soon as possible.